From NDPR, a review of The Species Problem: A Philosophical Analysis by Richard Richards. Bodies with histories: A review of Epigenetics: The Ultimate Mystery of Inheritance by Richard Francis, The Nature of Race: How Scientists Think and Teach about Human Difference by Ann Morning, and Fatal Invention: How Science, Politics, and Big Business Re-create Race in the Twenty-first Century by Dorothy Roberts. Razib Khan on how human races may have biological meaning, but races mean nothing about humanity. A review of Aping Mankind: Neuromania, Darwinitis and the Misrepresentation of Humanity by Raymond Tallis. From Slate, Sam Kean blogs the human genome. An excerpt from The Epigenetics Revolution: How Modern Biology Is Rewriting Our Understanding of Genetics, Disease, and Inheritance by Nessa Carey. A review of The Spark of Life: Electricity in the Human Body by Frances Ashcroft. New evidence proves humans are continuing to evolve and that significant natural and sexual selection is still taking place in our species in the modern world.

From H-Net, a review of Unbecoming British: How Revolutionary America Became a Postcolonial Nation by Kariann Yokota. Two centuries after its publication, Founding Father Benjamin Rush’s pioneering work on mental illness prompts alarm and admiration — as well as reminders about ongoing challenges in the mental-health field. New England industrialists hired thousands of young farm girls to work together in early textile mills — and spawned a host of unintended consequences. A look at how Alamo mythology got the upper hand on its history and misled the Raccoon People. Whatever else they did, the Irish forced "America to be America". The woman who took on the tycoon: John D. Rockefeller Sr. epitomized Gilded Age capitalism — Ida Tarbell was one of the few willing to hold him accountable. From WSWS, a four-part series on the Ludlow Massacre, the Colorado miners’ strike of 1913-1914. Michael Kazin on the fall and rise of the U.S. populist Left. June 6th, 1944 and June 15th, 1944: Why does the war in Europe during WWII overshadow the Pacific war?